A Haunting in Venice

A Haunting in Venice is a 2023 American mystery film produced and directed by Kenneth Branagh from a screenplay by Michael Green, loosely based on the 1969 Agatha Christie novel Hallowe'en Party. It serves as a sequel to Death on the Nile (2022) and is the third film in which Branagh reprises his role as the Belgian detective Hercule Poirot. The ensemble cast includes Kyle Allen, Camille Cottin, Jamie Dornan, Tina Fey, Jude Hill, Ali Khan, Emma Laird, Kelly Reilly, Riccardo Scamarcio, and Michelle Yeoh.
A Haunting in Venice was released in the United States on September 15, 2023, by 20th Century Studios. The film received generally positive reviews from critics and has grossed $119 million worldwide.
Plot
In 1947, Hercule Poirot lives in retirement in Venice, employing ex–police officer Vitale Portfoglio to act as a bodyguard. On Halloween, mystery writer Ariadne Oliver convinces Poirot to attend a Halloween party and séance at the palazzo of famed opera singer Rowena Drake and expose Joyce Reynolds, a World War I army nurse turned medium, as a fraud. The palazzo itself is claimed to be haunted by the spirits of children who, when the palazzo was an orphanage, were locked up and left to die when a plague swept through the city, with rumors that the spirits torment any nurses and doctors who dare to enter.
Rowena has hired Joyce to help her commune with her daughter Alicia, who reportedly died by suicide after her fiancé, chef Maxime Gerard, broke off their engagement. Among the guests in attendance are Maxime, Rowena's housekeeper Olga Seminoff, Drake family doctor Leslie Ferrier and his son Leopold, and Joyce's Romani assistant Desdemona Holland.
During the séance, Poirot deduces that Joyce has two assistants, revealing Desdemona's half-brother Nicholas hiding in the chimney. Joyce suddenly speaks in Alicia's voice and reveals she was murdered by one of the guests. Poirot attempts to confront Joyce, who tells him to lighten up and gives him her mask and robe. Seconds after an unknown assailant nearly drowns Poirot when he is apple bobbing, Joyce is found impaled on a statue in the courtyard.
With a storm cutting off the palazzo, Poirot interviews the guests, during which he witnesses manifestations of Alicia's ghost and hears a young girl humming a tune. The investigation yields perplexing results:
Leslie, severely traumatized by his experiences at the liberation of the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, is in love with Rowena.
Maxime, who was not initially invited, broke off his engagement because Rowena did not approve of him, and Alicia was obsessed with keeping her mother happy.
Nicholas and Desdemona have been stealing from Joyce and intend to use the money to travel to St. Louis, Missouri, which they fell in love with after seeing half of Meet Me in St. Louis at a displaced persons camp.
Leopold claims to hear voices from the spirits of children which are the same voices Poirot has been hearing ever since he was nearly drowned.
When the guests come across an underground chamber containing the skeletal remains of the dead children, Leslie suffers a panic attack and nearly kills Maxime. He is locked inside the music room to recover, Rowena giving Poirot the only key. After examining Maxime's invitation, Poirot deduces Oliver sent it and is conspiring with Vitale. Vitale, who investigated Alicia's death and resigned from the police as a result of the case, gave Joyce private details, while Oliver had hoped to use Poirot's incapability of explaining the supernatural as a plot for her next book. Leslie is then found stabbed to death.
Gathering the remaining guests together, Poirot reveals Rowena is the murderer. Obsessed with keeping Alicia for herself, she cut her off from contact with Maxime after learning they planned to reconcile and used small amounts of poisonous, hallucinogenic honey extracted from rhododendrons to weaken and then care for her; the same honey was seemingly the cause of Poirot's visions. One night, Olga unknowingly gave Alicia tea containing a fatal dose. Rowena, fearful of exposure, staged Alicia's suicide. When she began receiving blackmail threats, Rowena suspected either Joyce or Leslie. She pushed Joyce to her death after mistakenly attempting to drown Poirot and forced Leslie into stabbing himself via the palazzo's internal phone line by threatening to kill Leopold, hoping to pass off both deaths as part of the children's curse. When Poirot confronts Rowena on the roof, Alicia's ghost seems to appear to them both, pulling Rowena down off the building and into the canal where she drowns.
As dawn breaks, Poirot parts ways with Oliver, elects not to fire Vitale or unmask his involvement in the séance, and privately exposes Leopold as the blackmailer. Leopold explains he understood the poisoning signs his father missed, making the connection after realizing Rowena's first starring role was in an opera whose lead character is the "king of poisons". Poirot suggests Leopold and Olga clear their consciences by using the money to help the Hollands start a new life in the United States. After noting the possibility of an afterlife, he returns home to accept new cases.
Cast
Production
Development
20th Century Studios president Steve Asbell revealed in March 2022 that a script for a third Hercule Poirot film had been written by Michael Green, with Kenneth Branagh set to return as director and star. The film was based on a lesser-known Poirot novel for the plot. The film was confirmed in October 2022, with Jamie Dornan, Tina Fey, Jude Hill, Kelly Reilly and Michelle Yeoh among the cast. Branagh described the film as a "supernatural thriller" rather than a full-fledged horror film.
Filming
Filming began on October 31, 2022, with production occurring between Pinewood Studios and Venice.
Music
Hildur Guðnadóttir composed the score for the film in April 2023, marking the first in the series not to be composed by Branagh's frequent collaborator Patrick Doyle. The film's soundtrack album was released by Hollywood Records on September 15, 2023.
Release
A Haunting in Venice was released in the United States on September 15, 2023, by 20th Century Studios. The film had its red carpet premiere at the Odeon Luxe Leicester Square at the West End London on September 11 with none of the cast members in attendance due to the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike.
Reception
Box office
, A Haunting in Venice has grossed $42 million in the United States and Canada, and $76.9 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $118.9 million.
In the United States and Canada, A Haunting in Venice was projected to gross around $12 million from 3,305 theaters in its opening weekend. The film made $5.5 million on its first day, including $1.2 million from Thursday night previews (up from Niles $1.1 million). It went on to debut to $14.3 million, an improvement from Nile $12.9 million opening, and finished second behind holdover The Nun II. The film made $6.3 million in its second weekend, finishing in third.
Critical response
Audiences surveyed by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B" on an A+ to F scale, same as the first two installments, while those polled at PostTrak gave it a 73% overall positive score, with 48% saying they would definitely recommend the film.
Jason Zinoman, writing for The New York Times, called the film a "whodunit with a splash of horror" and wrote: "In straddling genres, Haunting can get stuck in the middle. But there's fun to be had there. What's consistent is the elegant visuals – striking cinematography by Haris Zambarloukos – which mark this movie's real genre as lavish old-fashioned Hollywood entertainment." Justin Chang of the Los Angeles Times said: "What lingers from this movie isn't the usual assemblage of clues and red herrings [..] but a free-floating air of grief, much of it rooted in the characters' turbulent memories of the war just a few years earlier". Similar sentiment was echoed by Ann Hornaday of The Washington Post who described the film as "moody", they both praised the cast's performances. Saibal Chatterjee wrote for NDTV: "A Haunting In Venice, a couple of jump scares notwithstanding, may not chill you to the bones but as a story focused on the emotional and psychological fallout of a devastating war, it works brilliantly".
Matt Zoller Seitz acclaimed the screenplay, direction and production values and said: "Movies are rarely directed in this style anymore". He added that it was an "empathetic portrayal of the death-haunted mentality of people from Branagh's parents' generation". Seitz and critic Michael Phillips (the Chicago Tribune) named it best of Branagh's Hercule Poirot films. The latter found the cast's acting "pretty crafty". About the performances, Mark Kermode said: " [...] everyone is given a 110 percent but not in a completely scenery chewing fashion, in a way that mixes old-fashioned and newfangled".
Some critics pointed out that the film struggled in its character development. Kristen Lopez, writing for TheWrap, felt that almost all the characters were underdeveloped due to the attention given to the production values, but praised the performances, singling out Reilly, Dornan and Yeoh. The Guardian chief film critic Peter Bradshaw also thought the film wasted its cast, awarding it two out of five stars.
In a negative review, critic Caryn James found the film "uninvolving" and said: "The new film is much pokier in its pacing, with duller characters". She commended Branagh, Fey and Cottin's performances, while stating that so many actors in the cast were "sleepwalking". In an equally negative review, David Fear of Rolling Stone called the film "anemic and sluggish" and said audiences would be "bored to death."
References
External links
20th Century Studios films
2020s American films
2020s English-language films
2020s mystery thriller films
2020s supernatural thriller films
American detective films
American films about Halloween
American haunted house films
American mystery thriller films
American sequel films
American supernatural thriller films
Filicide in fiction
Films about post-traumatic stress disorder
Films about suicide
Films affected by the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike
Films based on British novels
Films based on crime novels
Films based on Hercule Poirot books
Films directed by Kenneth Branagh
Films produced by Ridley Scott
Films scored by Hildur Guðnadóttir
Films set in 1947
Films set in Venice
Films shot at Pinewood Studios
Films shot in Venice
Films with screenplays by Michael Green (writer)
Murder mystery films
Poisoning in film
Scott Free Productions films
TSG Entertainment films